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Wednesday, May 18, 2011

Dai Guohong (pictured), a Chinese boy, who lost his two legs three years ago in the 2008 massive Wenchuan earthquake as a 18-year-old boy, has trained himself to be one of the country's top swimmers.

The roof on Dai's school fell on him and buried him and his 52 classmates under tones of rubbles.26 of his classmates survived in that quake. Both of Dai's legs were amputated and he underwent a series of operations to save his life.

"I felt very confused at that time," Dai said. "And I often locked myself in the ward. I do not want to speak to anyone. Sometimes, I shout at my father, mother, doctors and nurses."

A local disabled sports coach spotted him and encouraged him to train as a Paralympics swimmer.

"I didn't have any professional swimming training before. But doctors said swimming is good for my body, so I was gonna go try ," he explained.

Now, he is expected to compete in the next Paralympics to be held in London next year. However, before the earthquake, Dai could just float up with able-bodied hands and legs.

"No matter what performance I could reach, I will go back to class and meet new challenges," Dai said.

About Me

I am full-time Mass Communication faculty at Towson University in Maryland and adjunct faculty in the City University of New York (CUNY) Master's in Disability Studies program.
I research media and disability issues and wrote a 2010 book on the subject: Representing Disability in an Ableist World: Essays on Mass Media, published by Advocado Press.
The media have real power to define what the public knows about disability and that's what I research.